


I'll Be Good

by demisms



Category: Kingsman: The Secret Service (2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Bittersweet Ending, Character Death, Child Abuse, Domestic Violence, Foster Care, Gen, High School, Murder, Parent-Child Relationship, problem child, spy movies - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-04-03
Updated: 2016-06-26
Packaged: 2018-03-21 01:20:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 12,007
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3672132
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/demisms/pseuds/demisms
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“<i>Oxfords, not brogues</i>.”</p><p>Harry’d been keeping tabs on the Unwin’s on and off throughout the past five years, and he’s a resilient enough memory to immediately recall the code he’d given the two of them; to call on him if ever they needed a favor, help. Last he’d checked, Lee’s widows new husband beat her, had sent her to the A&E once. And while he had been itching to correct the uncouth slob about how one was supposed to handle another human being, it hadn’t been his place; not without that longstanding favor being invoked. And now the son — <i>Eggsy, was it?</i> — was muttering back and forth with Amanda from the tech department. And making dark requests.</p><p>“<i>Can you kill my foster father?</i>”</p><p>—</p><p>Or: the one where Eggsy becomes an orphan, guilt kicks in twelve years early and Harry Hart goes about honoring Lee Unwin's memory a whole 'nother way.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The One Where Eggsy Becomes An Orphan

**Author's Note:**

> more kingsman feelings, this time really aimed to hurt. please read the tags and proceed at your own discretion.

“No, stop, please don’t hurt him.”

 

“Shut — _up_ , Michelle!”

 

“Dean, don’t —”

 

“I swear to f _uckin_ g god, woman,”

 

“Eggsy, baby. Eggsy, run — _ah!_ ”

 

* * *

 

 

That’s the problem with marrying men who preferred to use their fists: to gain the upper hand in an argument, to make a point, to make themselves feel better. Sometimes they kill you.

 

* * *

 

 

Elizabeth Shwartz had a tight hold of her Pomeranians’ leash, and an even tighter grip on the cross that hung around her neck. She said a quick prayer — first for the woman in the body bag that the coroner was trying to be secretive about carrying down the concrete steps of the estates. Then for the bruised boy who’d been sat on the edge of a plater full of dry soil and dead plants as an emergency medical responder saw to the wounds on his face and arms. 

 

The child was too still, she noted, too tense. He didn’t even flinch when the paramedic prodded the cut over his eye, and certainly didn’t smile when the men offered reassurance. That wasn’t right, she thought. He ought to be screaming and crying. Or at least shouting, like Mr. Baker had been when the police escorted him out of the flat in handcuffs.

 

But Eggsy was deathly still, as still as Michelle’s corpse, and Elizabeth wants to offer him candy. A hug. A cup of milk — _anything_ , like she’d done when he’d fallen just outside her door last summer and scraped his knee. In the end, it had been petting Bindy that had made him stop crying. But Bindy was cowering in the company of the lights and beeping sirens, and something tells her that this time, it wouldn’t do the trick anyway.

 

They ask her for a brief statement — “I… I heard fightin’ and screaming. But I’ve always been hearing fightin’ and screaming from the two of them. I think she might have been cryin’…” — and shake their heads in grave distaste for the unnecessary loss of life. Then the officers start to disburse, and she sees one of them appear with a child’s duffle bag, hand it to the paramedic, and proceed to usher a numb looking Eggsy off planter and into the back of a police car.

 

“Hey,” Elizabeth (rather rudely and equally unabashedly) interrupts two of the police trying to coordinate who was going to stay and supervise the blood clean up. “Hey, what’s goin’ to happen to him?”

 

The square jawed woman rolls her eyes and walks away with her mouth to her radio, but the baby faced officer speaks with an unexpectedly gruff, uncultured drawl; like maybe he grew in these estates too. “Probably a group home. She didn’t have no close family.”

 

“What a pity…” she whispers to Bindy as the flashing lights fade into the distance. Elizabeth clutches the little dog to her chest and closes her blinds. She clicks her tongue and shakes her head accordingly, but this isn’t the first time this has happened. And it won’t be the last. “What a pity.”

 

* * *

 

 

That’s the problem with the foster system, too. Sometimes — not _always,_ but _sometimes_ — the state had a tendency to recruit families with much the same dynamic that’d landed their charges with them in the first place. Fists were usually involved. He’d be lying to say he hadn’t experienced his fair share of belts, too. 

 

But it’s the truly creative punishment, the one involving a bottle of hot sauce and a spoon (with an additional backhand when he’d refused to drink any more after he threw up the first time) that has him caving; has his resolve cracking.

 

It’s at ten, with worn trainers and the crusty remains of a bloody nose drying on his upper lip, that Gary Unwin picks the land line receiver off the wall in the kitchen of his foster home in the dead of night. For once (and only if he excused what sounded like Jamal crying out in his sleep) the house was quiet; so quiet that even the electric beeps the numbers make when he punches them sound deafening. 

 

“Customer complaints, how may I direct your call?”

 

“My mum told me to call this number if ever I needed a favor,” he mutters quietly, under his breath, and mindful of the stairs beyond the kitchen. If anyone were to come down them steps and find him on the phone, he’d get another beating for sure.

 

“I’m sorry love, I think you might have dialed the wro —”

 

“No,” he cuts across the woman on the other end of the line with an almost deceptively calm voice, not disclosing the mounting panic he’d felt in his chest when she’d tried to hang up on him. If the medal didn’t work — “She told me I had to say, um…”

 

* * *

 

 

Merlin takes his coffee with fat spoonfuls of sugar. The sucrose dissolves and gives lowly techs and his inferiors the illusion that he can down coffee as black as their new hires always think his soul his without so much as blanching. When in reality, his unsuspicious white mug held liquid diabetes. 

 

Every so often, the man tried to ween himself away from the caffeine; tries to drink tea instead and ultimately fails. He usually almost breaks something (or someone; electronics, people, they’re all replaceable) unless placated with a cuppa. And since Harry’s been out in the field until late this evening, and doesn’t know the last time his friend injected himself with caffeine, he’s careful not to mix up their cups when he joins them in the tech room around 00:45.

 

Not that he receives much thanks for his gift.

 

“You shouldn’t have that in here.”

 

“You’re _welcome_.”

 

“Thank you.” Merlin still doesn’t look up from the magnifying lens, poised over a tiny piece of a data drive, but Harry Hart thinks he sees a smirk playing around his mouth. He’s content to sit in silence and sip his own coffee — with a humble amount of sugar and a dash of milk — until his comrade is satisfied with his work, and looks up with a sigh and a hand on his stiff neck. “Don’t forget to file your mission report,” he reminds him, as if he could have forgotten about their post mission protocol after all these years.

 

Harry nods. “I’ve still got some writing to do. I killed —”

 

At that precise point in time, in his pocket, his cell phone started to ring. Deftly, and with a quick apology to Merlin, he extricates the rather bulky device with a smooth, practiced motion, and accepts the call. He’s fully prepared to say hello or some alternative polite greeting, but Harry quickly realizes this was one of the lines he’d had set up to be directly forwarded to his own cell, so as he could keep a pulse on whatever was being said on either end. It’s the operator line, he realizes, and then hears the voice. 

 

“ _Oxfords, not brogues_.”

 

Harry’d been keeping tabs on the Unwin’s on and off throughout the past five years, and he’s a resilient enough memory to immediately recall the code he’d given the two of them; to call on him if ever they needed a favor, help. Last he’d checked, Lee’s widows new husband beat her, had sent her to the A&E once. And while he had been itching to correct the uncouth slob about how one was supposed to handle another human being, it hadn’t been his place; not without that longstanding favor being invoked. And now the son — _Eggsy, was it?_ — was muttering back and forth with Amanda from the tech department. And making dark requests.

 

“ _Can you kill my foster father_?”

 

There’s the feedback that comes from someone on the other end breathing a little too hard, a little to close to the mouth piece, and Harry tightens his grip on the phone as Amanda undoubtedly shifts in her chair. But she’s all professionalism and curt tone when she responds — “Your complaint has been catalogued. And we hope we haven’t lost you as a loyal customer.” — and hangs up. Which, by proxy, hangs up Harry as well. 

 

He drags his phone from his ear, numbly blinking at the wall beyond Merlin’s head, because the _vehemence_ in that young boys voice…

 

“You alright, Galahad?”

 

_Foster father_ clicks right into place alongside _domestic abuse_ and _multiple emergency calls_ that stand out on the file of Michelle Unwin, and he’s quick to assume that the woman was either dead or had been deemed unfit of a mother. Neither were happy thoughts, and Harry nearly shatters his coffee mug, he’s holding it so tight.

 

“Harry.”

 

He’d missed something. Again. And now the little boy who’d he met on the carpet all those years ago was in danger, was asking him to kill someone who he’d never met, but whom he already despised. His heart is heavy in his chest, and his feet almost carry him of their own accord to the private underground tube that would escort him back to the shop. But he pauses, nods at Merlin and the large screen just beyond where he at on a swirling chair.

 

“Pull up the Lee Unwin file for me, would you?”

 

“ _Again,_ Harry?”

 

“Yes, again.”

 


	2. The One With No More Group Homes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this wasn't supposed to take this long, in fact it's been written in my notebook for a while. but i was mid-move and so it didn't get typed and posted. my bad, guys. next chapter is already half written, so it should hopefully be pretty soon you get the next installment. thank you all so much for the comments and kudos, they really feed my soul.
> 
> also it wasn't until i had finished this chapter that a friend of mine pointed out there's a movie called 'the secret service' with a character named stanely unwin it. guess the name just fits!
> 
> enjoy!

In the end, they don't _kill_ Martin Lewis.

 

* * *

 

 

It’s not that difficult to get forged documents when you’ve got an entire interdepartmental team who did nothing but make up new identities and passable cover stories for the Kinsmen agents. Harry has four passports in the safe behind the portrait of a particularly colorful butterfly in his study, and leans over the newest recruits desk, all smiles and soft compliments until she agreed to connect the dots he asks her to within the social security network. He walks into HQ that day single, with deceased parents and an estranged brother, and walks out that evening with a nephew that had died in Iraq five years ago — with a grandnephew who, until recently, he hadn’t known had become an orphan. 

 

Even expertly printed, the tired looking woman behind the desk at social services still looks skeptically between his paperwork and Harry himself. There had been ways to avoid this part of the formalities, too, but then he would have had to wait for three more months before Gary Unwin was put up to be transferred between foster homes again before swooping in. That was unacceptable as far as he was concerned, and left appealing directly to the government workers as the best — read: least traumatizing, sudden and abrupt for Gary — approach to take. The boy had, Harry estimated, been in the system for nine months. He was about to turn eleven and Harry figured the best way to (re)introduce himself into his life was in a fashion he was already familiar with; in a place he was already familiar with.

 

If only he could get past the woman behind the desk.

 

“And why didn’t you come forward when we was first looking for a suitable guardian, eh?” she asks eventually, seemingly rediscovering the gum she had stuck between her lip and teeth while she had been reading. Behind him, through the wall he could hear the front receptionists phone ringing and a baby crying. But Harry ignores the ruckus and leans a little forward over his crossed legs.

 

“I have, unfortunately, been out of the country.”

 

“What, since your nephew died?”

 

“On and off again.” That much was true, more or less. “On business.” She rustles through his papers, presumably looking for his occupation, so Harry politely provides: “Tailor.”

 

“ _Right_ , tailor.” He waits patiently again as she shifts around the papers on her desk (a gentleman doesn’t comment on disorganization) and peers at him through smudged glasses. “And if we send Gary home with you, you’ll be around more? He’d need to stay in school and you’d need to be available for home visits. None of this ‘on and off’ traveling.”

 

“Of course.”

 

“And you’d need to pass a background check.”

 

“Understandably.” And _Harry Hart_ , brother of Stanley Unwin, uncle of Lee Unwin, and only living relative of Gary Unwin, undoubtedly _would_.

 

“That process might take about a week.” Less understandable. Harry’s left eye twitches ever so slightly but he nods. “And we’d want to do a home inspection when we bring him, to make sure it’s an environment fit for children.”

 

“I’ve already a room being made up for him.” Or he _would_ have a room be made up for him as soon as he sent a rapid fire list of pseudo parenting necessities to Merlin and locked away all his guns. Harry briefly debated outright baby proofing, if that would assure he’d pass whatever anal retentive test he was about to be subjected to, but the boy is _ten_ ; that seems a little much. 

 

Once the social worker finished her list of required reading/state expectations he would have to meet, she nodded her head as if to say goodbye.

 

“May I see him?”

 

“What?”

 

“The boy. May I see him?” She seemed to chew on this idea for a few long moments, not unlike a cow on a particularly stubborn piece of cud. Benignly, Harry prompts: “It might be better for us to reacquaint ourselves somewhere he’s familiar and comfortable. Before he’s simply dropped on my doorstep and told he’s expected to live there. It’s been more than a few years since we’ve seen each other, you understand.”

 

It’s not a threat that hangs heavily in the air between them, simply the _weight_ of good manners and forethought that he’d generously applied throughout the whole conversation that she had _not_. Not to say he was superior to the gruff social worker in any sense — they’d both probably seen more of humanity than would allow them to sleep well at night — but glancing at the various case files and notes strewn all across her desk, he’d hazard a guess and say he was significantly more invested in the life and wellbeing of Gary Unwin than she. But since she holds the power here…

 

“Please.”

 

“…Yeah, alright. He’s on the premise anyway.”

 

Harry already knew that. Still, he arches his eyebrows with feigned curiosity as they stand. “Not in a foster home?”

 

“No, we’ve had a bit of a hiccup with his previous foster family.” By which she means Martin and Annie Lewis are currently being investigated — and will most likely be incarcerated — for heavy drug trafficking on top of child abuse. He’d read the file. He’d lodged the anonymous complaint. “This way, Mr. Hart.”

 

* * *

 

 

The boy’s sharp.

 

“Don’t I know you?” he asks, all tight jaw and hard eyes. They’re in a playroom full of all manner of bright, plus, well worn toys, but Gary isn’t touching any of them. He seems content to pin Harry with a deeply suspicious stare.

 

“I don’t think we’ve met before, Gary, but I’m —”

 

“Eggsy.”

 

“Pardon?”

 

“My name. ’S Eggsy, not Gary.”

 

And… yes, Harry remember something to that effect having been how the child had introduced himself five years ago. He smiles, nods, and tries again. “Eggsy,” it bears repeating, if only to get the defensive scowl off his lips. “We haven’t met before, but I’m your fathers uncle. Your grandfathers brother.”

 

“Granddad Stanley?” A flicker of recognition dances across the boys face, and if Harry had to hazard a guess, he’d say that Eggsy had at least one fond memory of his grandfather that had served to _grandfather_ this new stranger masquerading as family into his good graces. Because the child wrinkles his face in good natured skepticism. “But he were, like, _really_ old.”

 

“ _Younger_ brother,” he elaborates, and when Eggsy almost grins, Harry smiles. “Which would make me your great-uncle.”

 

There’s a healthy silence. Which quickly stretches into an uncomfortable silence when Eggsy doesn’t respond. The hint of a smile disappears from around his mouth and he stares at Harry with dark ringed — and Galahad knew enough about bruises to know when they’re from sleep deprivation and when they’re from fists — eyes. He looks sad, but it’s masked with the preemptive defensiveness of the consistently disappointed. _He doesn’t think I’m here to help him_ , Harry realizes a second before the boy cracks. Angrily.

 

“So what?” Eggsy spits. “You just come to check up on me? Outta some sort of… some sort of… —!”

 

“Moral obligation?” Harry supplies.

 

“ _Yeah_! That.”

 

That jab against his character smarts, but only serves to strengthen his resolve. He’s not exceptionally good with children, but there’s an urge to scoot around the table that’s so short it’s hurting his knees to sit at, and to put a hand on Eggsy;s shoulder; to comfort someone so obviously wounded. But he’s good enough with _people_ on a broader scale to know when touch — any touch — would be distinctly unwelcome. So Harry stays put, keeps a level head in the face of a very childlike misdirected anger, and shakes his head.

 

“No, Eggsy, I am not here out of any sense of mere obligation.” (Admittedly, though, he kind of is.) “Nor am I here to simply _check up_ on you.” That confuses the boy — something in his face twitches, like he’s not quite ready to believe what he’s being told. “I’ve come to file the required paperwork with your social worker. And, I suppose,t o ask you if you’d like to come live with me.”

 

The child across from him is doing his best to maintain a stiff facade of toughness, but there’s a flicker of hope, he sees; something about his face softens (unintentionally, perhaps) and Eggsy’s mouth opens long before he speaks. “Are you…for real?”

 

“Very real.”

 

“No more group homes?”

 

“No more group homes,” Harry promises. And impulsively adds: “No more foster fathers.”

 

Eggsy’s open mouth snaps shut with the click of teeth and the gurgle of a hard swallow.

 

“Would you like that?”

 

“…Yeah, that sounds alright.”

 

* * *

 

 

Of _course_ he’s approved.

 

* * *

 

 

“You’re out of your fucking mind, Harry,” Merlin grunts. Harry knows the man’s just frustrated that he can’t discern the instructions for the Swedish made twin sized captains bed that is currently sitting in pieces all around his knees.

 

* * *

 

 

Eggsy’s had time to work himself up to cautious district again by the time he’s finally deposited on Harry’s doorstep by a perpetually overworked and frazzled social worker, who rather rudely brushes off his invitation inside for tea. Just as well, she had never rubbed him the right way and this means Harry can give Eggsy the tour without the scrutiny of an underpaid, unenthusiastic government official. Not that the guided tour through his house is _completely_ free of scrutiny. 

 

“What’s with the butterflies?”

 

“That’s a really fucking old television.”

 

“Where’s your stereo? …Nah, that ain’t a stereo, it’s got a _horn_ on it.”

 

“Is that a real dog? What the _hell_?”

 

And finally —

 

“Is this my room?”

 

“No.”

 

They’re standing in the doorway of the third, and smallest bedroom in his two story home. It was probably intended to be an office once upon a time, but his cherry red, thoroughly papered office was located on the first floor; this smaller room had been predominantly used as storage for the past twenty years, but now the sparse few boxes had been moved up to the attic and a thin, plain bed and desk had been set up. The decor was far too mature for a typical ten year old, far too bland, but Eggsy hadn’t sounded disappointedat the prospect of this room being his. He was poking at the tan bedspread and pulling open the drawers of the desk with interest until Harry revealed that this would be the live-in nanny’s room.

 

“I don’t need no babysitter,” Eggsy insists.

 

“I don’t need _a_ babysitter.”

 

“I don’t need _no_ babysitter.”

 

Harry sighs. “Which she doesn’t have to be unless you choose to think of her that way.” Patricia Adams had worked in their IT department, but had recently retired to spend less time transcribing reports on bombed cities and dead children, and more time with her new grandchildren. It had been a shame to see her go; not only had she been one of the smartest, most capable people he’d ever known, but she had been one of his competitors for the position of Galahad all those years ago. Which meant she was more than capable of handling a perpetually disgruntled preteen as she was any unsavory characters that may follow him home one day. It wasn’t unheard of. 

 

She had also been very bored in early retirement and had all but jumped at the opportunity to do something other than water the garden and play with babies twice a week, even if that something was heading a child to and from school for a week or so every month. 

 

Not many of the Kingsman agents elected to have families. For obvious reasons. The time and commitment it would take to have a spouse, to lie to a spouse would be incredibly taxing on top of their missions, and nothing compared to rearing a child. Harry didn’t know a single agent that was still happily married, nor who saw their children very regularly. Percival was the smartest amongst them, it seemed, having foregone marriage entirely and children entirely, simply throwing himself into his work; then into his extended family every time he needed something a little more domestic than narrowly avoided crashing airplanes into mountains. The number of times they’d all had to hear him wax poetic about his sisters daughter was bordering the _thousands_ by now.

 

But while it wasn’t common, it did happen. And there were procedures in place, just as they were for every other uncommon common occurrence. Harry would take considerably fewer international missions until his new charge was sixteen; he would amend his will to leave everything (the house, a sizable chunk of money, anything he could want) to Eggsy, and to arrange him a spot in a fine boarding school should his untimely death blindside them all. It was better to be prepared than not, and Harry figured he owed Lee Unwin enough that five years virtual desk duty was nothing. Fewer international missions didn’t mean none at all, and despite his promise to the social worker, Harry suspected he would still be out of the house. A lot.

 

“My work demands I spend a lot of time not at home, Eggsy, and I cannot in good conscious leave you alone for a handful of days at a time.”

 

“I thought you was a tailor,” he leered, and Harry made a mental note to address parenting handbooks on the best way to incentivize a child to use proper damned grammar. “What’s a tailor got to travel for?”

 

“Kingsman tailors clothe some of the richest, most important men and women in the world. And when they’re paying for convenience in addition to a well fitted suit, then we come to them.”

 

“Can’t I just come with you?”

 

The boy sounds legitimately hopeful. But for a wide variety of reasons, Harry has to say — “No, Eggsy.” — and watch his face fall.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> and if you can guess who percival's niece is, you get a prize.
> 
> comments & kudos make the world go around.


	3. The One Where Eggsy Fights In School

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wow, an update? is this real life? 
> 
> unbeta'd, un-britpicked. i'm sorry :c

There’s problems, of course.

 

* * *

 

It’d been expected.

 

Eggsy’s initial distrust evaporated within the first month and a half. He has his own room, his own space that he neither needs to share with other unhappy, displaced children nor angry, violent adults. He has a structured schedule that Harry’d more or less blocked out from a parenting textbook; school, after school activities, homework, perhaps an hour of television, dinner, and a strict 9 o’ clock bedtime. He has real (organic, high quality, well balanced, home cooked) meals and, arguably most importantly, he has Harry (“Just call me Harry,” he’d told the boy on their second day together, when Eggsy had visibly struggled with calling him _uncle_ ) Hart, who didn’t hit him. Ever. Who doesn’t raise a hand to him at all, and seldom raises his voice.

 

He’s reenrolled in gymnastics within the week. 

 

“I heard you could have been Olympic team material,” Harry says, and Eggsy is too busy waffling, unsure what to do with the praise making him hot in the face to ask how Harry had known that without talking to his instructor. Mrs. Privit is delighted to have him back, and for the first time in a long time, he has a legitimate excuse for coming to school with bumps and bruises.

 

“I fell off a pommel horse!” he tells a girl named Charlotte, poking at the discoloration on his forearm, and delighting in how her eyes bulge and she starts to fuss over him.

 

The first (and only) time Eggsy steals a candy bar is while he and Mrs. Adams are at the grocers. She finds him out immediately and makes him return it, which makes his face burn and something ugly twist in his chest. But the disgust on the check out clerks face isn’t half so bad as the disappointment on Harry’s later that evening. He’s sat down in the living room and given a long lecture about right and wrong, about _morals_ and _manners_ , and when he cries at the end it’s mostly out of shame. And perhaps a little bit of fear — what proper gentleman would want a thief as a nephew? Now Harry was going to send him _back_.

 

But instead, he offers Eggsy incentive; compensation. An allowance, to be awarded for everything from helping around the house in his absence to positive reviews from Mrs. Adams, his teachers, and coaches. He’s no reason to steal if he can pay for things.

 

* * *

 

It’s like something out of a dramatic, made for television movie. Eggsy watches _Annie_ for the first time on the living room floor and makes a point to turn back to where Harry was reading in his armchair to tell him he _ain’t never gonna call you Daddy Warbucks_.

 

* * *

 

He never calls him _daddy_. Nor _Uncle_. Just Harry.

 

(Except once.)

 

* * *

 

(“Come on, you pleb.”

 

“‘M gonna kick your arse, Charlie.”

 

“Do it. I’ll tell my father and you’ll be kicked out, like you should be.”

 

“’N I’ll tell mine you fucking _deserved_ it.”)

 

* * *

 

He fights in school. Quite a few times in those early years. Eleven, twelve, and thirteen are not kind ages for children — even well-bred private school children were ruthless when a boy with no parents and a southern drawl showed up and said his name was Eggsy. On a base level, Harry knows what his charge might be feeling and _why_ Eggsy lashes out despite the incredible resilience he’d shown up to this point. And when the headmaster calls him in (practically twice a semester, those first three years) he has to bite his tongue when the greying old man waxed poetic about therapy and transfers — _for Gary’s own good._

 

_Eggsy_ , Harry sees fit to remind him, and the Heskeths (or more often, their nanny) roll their eyes.

 

The headmaster beats around the bush, slouched in a high backed chair like he thinks he’s _Arthur_ or something, and Harry can feel his eye twitching each and every time. He gets it; they’re not happy, but think too highly of Mr. Hart(’s money) to outright expel his nephew for what the old man calls _a bit of healthy brawling_ and chuckles about. Funny how he stops laughing and starts squirming when Harry pins him with steady, blank eye contact and asks what he intends to do about the bullying.

 

“Do you want to switch schools?” he asks, glancing at the rear view mirror while they sit in bumper to bumper traffic after yet another hour long discussion with the Headmaster and Eggsy’s teachers. This one had gotten rather heated, and Harry got the distinct impression that he made the staff at that school very uncomfortable with just how much he knew about the goings on within their grounds — without even installing cameras around the building, just by recognizing a hostile environment and deducing the goings on. (And, alright, once he’d convinced Merlin to hack the servers. Just once.)

 

The boy is sitting to his right, a lap full of drying bloody tissues and the beginnings of an excellent bruise around his mouth. He refuses to look at Harry, despite the calm tone he’s purposefully using 

 

“No.”

 

“Do you want to take some sort of hand to hand combat lessons? I’d much rather pay for them than sit through another of those meetings.”

 

“No, it’s not — I don’t like fighting.”

 

“I wouldn’t believe that from looking at you.”

 

“ _Harry_ —”

 

Alright, that admittedly hadn’t been funny, and Harry coughs by means of apology. They sit in silence for a little while, because he’s learned that usually if he gives Eggsy the space and time to talk, the boy would fill _hours_ with his thoughts. And eventually, this time, he fills the space with doubts.

 

“They laughed at me.”

 

Eggsy doesn’t wear vulnerable comfortably. Harry keeps his eyes on the road, hands on the steering wheel, and tone calm. “There will always be people who laugh.”

 

“They think they’re better ’n me.”

 

“There will always be people who think they’re better than others.”

 

“They’re right.”

 

“ _That_ is bullshit.” And he can feel — and see out of the corner of his eye — Eggsy stiffen with surprise, still not quite accustomed to hearing his caretaker swear, and knows the boy is favoring him with his full attention now. It was a prime ‘learning moment’, as Merlin had come to call them. “There’s no real advantage to be found in thinking one superior to your fellow man,” he paraphrases Hemingway with little effort, and gives the steering wheel a sharp tap to remind the car in front of them to move. “…Only your former self, as the saying goes. But do _not_ let those boys dictate your worth to you, Eggsy.”

 

There’s a long pause, weighted on Eggsy’s end as he digests and thinks on what wisdom Harry’d had to impart. They drive, stop, and drive again. The boy dabs at the last few dribbles of blood leaking from his nose, then sniffs.

 

“There’s girls too.”

 

“Oh, well if there’s _girls_ , I suppose what they say goes.”

 

“ _Harry_ —”

 

But this time it _is_ funny, and Eggsy’s laughing.

 

* * *

 

They talk sex, past Eggsy’s sudden and unrelenting fascination with girls, after a rather… embarrassing incident.

 

“Are you and he like…” He gestures between the two of them, sitting across the table and clutching cups of tea like proper Englishmen, like a vice. Eggsy has hot cocoa, but hasn’t really touched it much in favor of staring between Harry and Merlin with utter disbelief. 

 

“No,” Merlin says.

 

“Yes,” Harry corrects, and they spend most of the next ten minutes glaring at each other and haltingly trying to communicate the idea of _long term friends with benefits_ to a thirteen year old without giving him the impression that this was how the normal world worked. Both men knew they operated _out_ of the realm of normalcy, and preferred it that way, but Eggsy was being healthily conditioned by the nuclear family prototype, and his sexual education next year would probably be entirely heteronormative and push abstinence. It was a tricky slope to navigate.

 

“So he’s your boyfriend but not?” is the ultimate take away, and when Merlin decides he’s getting properly dressed — out of Harry’s ridiculously red dressing gown — and leaving. 

 

They’re still at the table when the door slams, and Harry’s about to put his head in his hands when Eggsy slides an upturned palm across the table. Looking up he sees the boy grinning. “High five, Harry — gimme some!”

 

“No, Eggsy.”

 

* * *

 

He never gets straight answers for all the questions he asks.

 

_Why you covered in bruises? Who'd you tailor for in Alaska? Why you just call him Merlin?_

 

And after seven years, he stops asking.

 

* * *

 

It’d been hard at first. There’d been problems. It’d been miles better than group homes and foster parents, but by the time Harry Hart had swooped into his life like some benevolent bird, Eggsy’d already learned how to navigate the treacherous waters of the all boys dorm, how to stake claim on his bed and keep the other kids from stealing his shit in the government homes; learned how to tell which foster parents were going to hit, and how hard, and when. _Un_ learning that defensiveness had been a big deal, and learning _manners_ and _platitudes_ that his benefactor expected of him — _that_ had been hard.

 

But after a rather bumpy start, things had gotten easier. He and the nanny had gotten on better, and after a slew of dodgy answers to his rather normal questions, Eggsy learned to just stop asking. Part of him holds true to the idea that _this_? Is temporary. And he doesn’t want to jeopardize his new home life (the comfortable one, where he’s well fed, well clothed, and wants for nothing) just because he’s a little curious. Another part of him doesn’t want to be annoying, or for Harry to simply _tolerate_ him. Which, sometimes when he disappears for days on end without so much as a telephone call, it does.

 

Even at sixteen, _almost_ seventeen, and too old for nannies, an empty house isn’t as much of a delight as it could be. The floorboards creak and the windows rattle in the wind. So when it looks like it’s going to rain, Eggsy blasts Dizzee Rascal and lolls about his room in his boxers and a baggy t-shirt. He’d been flirting with a girl in his class, and was quite set on jacking Harry’s car and taking her out — hey, if the old man weren’t home and weren’t calling, it weren’t stealing.

 

But there’s suddenly a voice — “I expect you’ll be deaf by the time you’re my age, what with that music as loud as it is.” — calling good naturally to him from down the hall, and Eggsy drops everything.

 

There’s an almost comedic record scratch when he punches the power button on his stereo and nearly collides with his doorframe in an attempt to jog out in the hallway and greet his (not) uncle. “ _Oi_ ,” Eggsy scoffs by way of saying hello. His attempt at indignant doesn’t do much to keep the delighted grin from curling his mouth. “‘Bout _fucking_ time. I was startin’ to think you’d _died_.”

 

“Yes, _good evening_ , Eggsy.” Harry looks tired, but he’s reaching out to squeeze Eggsy’s shoulder. Once upon a time he might have ruffled his hair. “Two weeks gone and the house is still standing. Though I see you were testing the foundation with your bass.”

 

They’ve had a number of run-in’s like this: late at night, when Harry returned home from some business trip or another, and Eggsy’d woken up or — to Mrs. Adam’s chagrin — was still awake and reading some comic book or another under the covers, and throwing them aside to watch his guardian climb the stairs. He’d hovered just on the other side of the door at first, determined to remain unseen. Then gradually decided it was fine to be in the doorway. Then to be at the top of the stairs.And now there were no holds barred, and he greeted Harry like a rather excited, needy pet.

 

Once in a blue moon, he might even hug him.

 

“Yeah,” Eggsy drawls. “I even stocked your pantry.”

 

“Crisps, java cakes, and energy drinks hardly make for a balanced diet.”

 

“There’s an apple in the fridge, too.”

 

“A _whole_ apple?”

 

“Hey!”

 

Eggsy Unwin was growing up to be a right sarcastic prick and it was all because of Harry Hart, who probably had a doctorate in sarcasm that he hid in his desk to make room for all those ridiculous, random newspaper scraps hung up in his office. But they’re smiling at each other, despite being about to peel off for sleep and solitude. Harry looks tired, and when he rolls his shoulders, something pops.

 

“It _is_ good to be home.”

 

And though the criticism of his dietary choices earns a scowl (it wasn’t as if _Harry_ had to eat it), Eggsy’s too delighted about not being alone anymore to be truly disheartened. They’ve butted heads their fair share in the past, but Eggsy’d come around to realize that that was just a part of growing up; that fighting didn’t always end with a slap in the face or a demeaning comment; that if he talked to Harry like an adult, Harry talked to him like one too. And he usually missed the grumpy, secretive, occasionally vulgar old man quite a lot. 

 

“Yeah, ‘m glad you’re back too.” It’s late. He should be in bed and Harry’s probably jet lagged and ready to call it a night. But before they part —

 

“Hey, can I use your car tomorrow?”

 

“Glad to see me, but eager to take my car.” Harry’s tone is dry, and he’s turning away to drop his briefcase just inside the door to his bedroom. “If your sentiments were just a means to appeal to my good nature, your extortion techniques could use some finesse. Fortunately for you, I left the keys on your bureau while I was away, just to the left of the tie pins. Which I’m sure you would have seen _eventually_ , if you were to ever _use them_.”

 

Eggsy doesn’t miss the grin before they close their respective doors. 

 


	4. The One With A Job

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> alright so! this fic now has a prospective end, and will probably total about seven chapters. i've gone back and nitpicked a few parts of previous chapters, the only real important one being that harry's 'estranged sister' in chapter two is now an estranged brother. 
> 
> i'm also in the market for a beta reader, both for the rest of this fic and for potentially two other larger kingsman works. please hit me up in a private message if you're interested.

And eventually, he gets Eggsy a job.

 

* * *

 

 

“That’s nepotism, Harry.”

 

“Hm.”

 

* * *

 

 

“But he’s not exactly _one of us_.”

 

“With respect, Arthur, you’re a snob.”

 

“With respect?”

 

* * *

 

 

By nineteen, Eggsy’s mellowed out considerably. He finishes secondary school with such high marks that some of his teachers faces visibly fall when he reveals he’s no plans to pursue a higher education, or to attend university. Likewise, his gymnastics coach is obviously heartbroken, bordering furious by the disinterest he shows her scholarship papers. 

 

“You know your attendance does not hinge on scholarship availability,” Harry makes a point of saying aloud one evening, just in case Eggsy was doing hat thing he does where he’s self deprecating and thinks of himself as a financial liability. They live comfortably, but not beyond their means; Kingsman offers more compensation than highly paid medical professional would glean annually, and Harry has excellent savings — which had branched into a college fund for Eggsy at the very start. A college fund which they apparently weren’t going to be needing.

 

He’s pushing his beans around his plate idly, but meets Harry’s gaze (he does that now) and after a second, shrugs. “I know. Just don’t really want to go.”

 

“May I ask what you’re planning on doing with all your free time now that you’re not in school?”

 

For the most part, Eggsy’s rather good about not talking with his mouth full. But he spears a green bean on his fork and shoves it into his mouth like some nervous tick before confessing: “I was thinking about the Marines.”

 

“A very nobel pursuit,” Harry agrees, nodding his head after a moments thought. The boy really was like his father. “I suggest you start on the required application paperwork sooner rather than later.”

 

Harry Hart was the younger of the two Hart boys. His father had been a proper gentleman, well versed in the clinical detachment of the rich. His mother had been a rather weepy housewife with little love for anything except her garden and dog paintings at a certain point in her life. His other brother had been short, and a textbook case of a Napoleon Complex, and had had no problem rubbing his every success and achievement in Harry’s face their whole lives. When his father had died, sum twenty years past, it’d been the first time he’d seen his mother or George since they’d so viscerally turned up their noses as his cover profession. _“Really, Harry, a tailor?”_ his brother had leered across the dinner table his first night home after completing training and taking up the mantle of Galahad — then George bristled when Harry’d cooly sipped his wine and offered to make him a suit that would _accentuate his legs_. His mother had scoffed, and his father’d had a few less than lovely comments to make, and Harry remembered feeling distinctly disappointed, but not at all surprised. Perhaps a little resentful that he couldn’t tell them the real nature of his profession and watch their eyes bulge.

 

But being a spy would somehow have managed to be a disappointment too, no doubt.

 

Eggsy’d given up playing with his food and gone to clear the table while Harry’d been lost in thought, and is jarred back to the present when his charge asks if he’s done with his plate. And Harry’s _moved_ ; struck suddenly with how decent and brave and driven a human being he’d managed to help raise.

 

“I think you’re going to do great things in whatever walk of life you choose to pursue, Eggsy.”

 

The boy — more of a young man now, but habit persists — stops short, looks at him with the pinched, awkward expression expression; like he wants to put up a fuss about the praise, but secretly loves it. “Thanks… Harry,” he eventually manages, and makes a rather hasty retreat into the kitchen.

 

* * *

 

 

Halfway through enrollment, Eggsy decides that the Marines aren’t for him after all.

 

“Sorry,” he tells Harry in the living room (like there’s actually anything to be sorry for), shifting his weight from foot to foot and trying to look defiant in the face of obvious shame. “I don’t want to be like my dad.”

 

* * *

 

 

Merlin doesn’t have a snuggly bone in his body, so they never do anything as cliche as _cuddle_ after they fuck. Usually, especially if it’s hot, they simply kick off the sheets and sprawl in various states of undress. In the past, sometimes they’d smoked, or Harry would have gotten up to make them drinks. But that was before terms like _alcoholism_ and _lung cancer_ were of big concerns.

 

But this time Merlin says —

 

“You know, he’d be perfect for Kin —”

 

— and Harry disappears, only to carry in two tumblers of whiskey into bed with them a few moments later.

 

* * *

 

 

“I don’t want to be like my dad.”

 

“Your father was a very brave man.”

 

Eggsy sighs.

 

* * *

 

 

The boy _is_ perfect for Kingsman, however, and Harry gets him a job. Just not the one Merlin had been hinting at.

 

He sets him up at the front desk so the rather aged Oliver can take a day or two off every so often, and has someone to run errands for him as needed. Usually Eggsy prefers polos and blue jeans to finely tailored suits, but subscribes to the shops unspoken dressed with little complaint. He wears nice slacks, and throws in a little creative flare by shrugging off the jacket and folding his sleeves up past his elbows. More than once or twice, Harry’s caught him posted up behind the register, texting while pretending to read, or else winking at young ladies who seem to be more taken with his forearms than they are the bolts of fabric they’d been perusing. 

 

He’s not really all that surprised.

 

* * *

 

 

(Merlin tells him once that Eggsy still wears his medal under his shirts; _that’s_ a surprise.)

 

* * *

 

 

“He’s got the agility and the discipline, Harry, why not?”

 

“Because I see a young man who’s got potential and who wants to do something _good_ with his life.”

 

“And Kingsman’s not good enough?”

 

He doesn’t deign to answer.

 

* * *

 

 

Eggsy befriends — or becomes quite taken with, Harry can’t tell and doesn’t ask about — Percival’s niece, Roxanne. She’d come to the shop one day while visiting Central London, and while the adult had been swept away to deal with confidential matters upstairs, the two of them had gotten into a rather heated debate about politics — which had eventually gravitated into an even more aggressive conversation about football. Eggsy favored Cornwall, it was always a spot of contention in respectable company. 

 

But based on the easy smiles, and the quick exchange of phone numbers as Percival bid Roxanne ( _“ — but call me Roxy.”_ ) follow him out of the shop, neither held any real ill will.

 

They text a lot. Or at least Eggsy talks about the young Ms. Morton’s antics a lot despite neither of them having a lot of free time to hang out in person. It’s nice to see his face light up a little every time his mobile blipped. So nice that Harry almost didn’t feel the need to chastise his ward for texting at the dinner table.

 

Almost.

 

“Eggsy, etiquette is the building block of society and one of the few things keeping humanity suspended above savagery may as well be table manners, so would you _please_ —”

 

“ _Alright_ , Harry, _shit_!”

 

* * *

 

 

Eggsy’s an excellent employee. He’s fast, accurate with the money, and polite — even in the face of outright condescension.

 

One evening, after coming to pick him up and idling while the young man finished with his last customer, Harry’d stood at the register. Stiff backed and with a grim scowl.

 

“You know you don’t have to stand for that,” he tells him after, nodding in the direction of the door to indicate the two young men who had just gone out of their way to treat Eggsy as if he were subhuman. They’d talked over him, ignored his comments and advice about fabric patterns and cut despite Eggsy very much knowing what he was talking about, made subtle japes about the drawl of his accent, and not even bothered to hide the way they rolled their eyes. It was the sort of indecency Harry himself wouldn’t have just _weathered_ , and bristles defensively even though Eggsy doesn’t seem all that bothered. 

 

The young man just shrug, setting the till in order as he closed up. “’s alright.”

 

“It isn’t.” He blames the muscle memory born from years of fighting the boys self righteous headmasters and teachers. Primal paternal defensiveness apparently never fades. 

 

“They’re just pricks.” And somehow _they_ doesn’t sound like it just pertains to the two individuals who’d just left the shop, but before Harry can open his mouth to ask if there’ve been other rude customers, Eggsy continues. “No use thinking on it too hard. Come on, Harry, let’s go eat.”

 

“Eggsy —”

 

“I’m thinking Italian. Can we go to that place with the garlic rolls?”

 

* * *

 

 

The only real drawback to employing Eggsy at Kingsman — aside from apparently exposing him to more upperclass brats who couldn’t look anywhere except down their noses — is that it increases the chances of the boy running into him fresh from a mission. Being seen rumpled and bloody would blow a distinct (shot gun blast sized) hole in the front he’s painted as a traveling tailor.

 

His ability to lie on the spot is only really tested once, as he’s stumbling out of dressing room two with little thought to what might be on the other side of the door. Eggsy’d been halfway down the staircase behind the desk, and had gone absolutely bug eyed at the sight of Harry covered in blood and his jacket torn and singed. He’d dropped everything and practically vaulted over the desk to loudly fret at his foster father. “What _happened_ to you?” he’d spluttered, hands out but careful not to touch, like he’s worried he might hurt Harry, and hasn’t quite realized it’s not all his blood.

 

“I’m fine, Eggsy.”

 

“Bullshit.”

 

“No, really. It was just a minor car crash.” Had certainly felt like one, despite more accurately having been an explosive device that he’d failed to disarm in time. He’d subsequently had to crawl through the mess of civilian casualties the bomb had left in its wake, and had held a small boy with no legs until (he’d died) emergency services had arrived. His own minor bumps and bruises had been seen to at UK HQ, then he’d hopped a bullet train to the shop to debrief with Arthur — the perpetrators were still at large, they’d need to send more agents after him — only to run into Eggsy. 

 

( _“What’s your name, young man?”_

 

_“Eggsy.”_

 

_“Hello, Eggsy.”_ ) 

 

( _“What’s your name, young man?”_

 

_“Katzir.”_

 

_“You’re going to be alright, Katzir.”_ )

 

“I’m fine, Eggsy, I promise.”

 

“We’ve gotta — I’ve gotta get you to the A&E, hold on.”

 

“You’ve got work —”

 

“ _No_.”

 

For a moment, agitation bubbles up in his chest. He considers pushing past the boy to get upstairs, fuck his cover identity. But there’s a grim sort of determination in the curve of Eggsy’s lip, and he finds his exhausted, stunned body cooperating as he’s steered through the front door and into a taxi cab. 

 

In the end, Arthur is displeased that he missed their appointment. The doctors call his suit jacket a biological hazard, and destroy it. His chart reads nothing like it would had he been in a simple car accident, but as soon as he’s discharged and sent home, Eggsy doesn’t ask any more questions.

 

* * *

 

 

“Where you going this time?”

 

“Bulgaria.”

 

“Yeah? Always fancied Bulgaria. Can I come with you?”

 

Harry sighs. “I’m afraid not.”

 

Eggsy doesn’t ask _why_ anymore, either. 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> kudos and comments feed the soul, babes ❤


	5. The One Where They Fight

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks for sticking with me despite how long it tends to take me to update this story, you're all very much loved. i should totally be doing uni work now but whatevs! (now someone draw me fanart~)

James Porter dies in the field.

 

* * *

 

 

Part of Harry desperately, selfishly hopes that Eggsy isn’t home when he returns; practically prays for him to be out with Roxy or Jamal, or even joyriding around in his car. He’d even tolerate him coming home at some ungodly hour covered in bruises, and lying about going free running on private property.

 

But no. He’s sprawled out in the living room with his feet up on the couch and all the lights on. Too tired for much more, Harry stifles a sigh and gives a cursory, “Hello, Eggsy.”

 

And, engrossed as he is in his reading, Eggsy only gives a polite, “Hi, Harry,” in return.

 

He notes, before trudging upstairs to a very welcome drink and sleep, that the boy has the case file from his mothers murder in his hands. They’d requested it a six months ago, at Eggsy’s insistence, and been equally heartbroken to learn that Michelle Baker had been pregnant when she died. Every now and again, near monthly, Eggsy would re-read the neatly typed, detached file and become very, very quiet…

 

* * *

 

 

They drink to Lancelot. Arthur demands their candidates be at UK HQ by 10pm GMT, and Harry leaves the shop feeling distinctly off balance. Merlin calls him via mobile at one point during the taxi ride back home, but Harry already knows what he’s going to say — something a little too personal to be brought up in front of Chester King, something to do with records and school reports and sports achievements that he wishes he could encrypt. Not that long lines of code would be any good against the likes of Merlin, especially when Eggsy told the other man just about everything anyway. 

 

He lets his phone go to voicemail.

 

* * *

 

 

He could, theoretically, propose someone at random. Comb through a small pool of randomly selected university graduates based on their academia and military experience, and make a selection based on who he thought would be the best fit for Kingsman. That was how most of them did it on these more somber occasions, when they didn’t have anyone to nominate personally. 

 

(Years ago — more than a decade — that’d been roughly how he’d stumbled upon Lee Unwin; had been reading potential recruit files to replace the Lancelot known as George Kinney, and had stumbled upon Lauren Hall. She’d a stiff lip and hadn’t looked particularly friendly or personable, traits which she seemed to share with her father, an astonishingly high ranked military official who most recently had been quoted praising a young man — “L. E. Unwin” — for being an exceptional cadet and spraining an ankle attempting to drag a friend to medical… )

 

* * *

 

 

In the end, he doesn’t pick a candidate at all.

 

“I had expected you to propose a recruit along with everyone else, Galahad,” Arthur reprimands along the grand, but not especially _round_ table the next time they eat lunch together. Then shifts slightly, scoops a small spoon of soup up, and pauses to add, “And hopefully someone a little more suitable this time around.”

 

“Hm,” Harry noncommittally shrugs off that statement, and smoothly transitions onto the topic of his latest mission. He’s going to Imperial College tomorrow morning, to have a discussion with Professor Arnold regarding his supposed kidnapping…

 

* * *

 

 

“Hey, Harry, what’re you doing tomorrow?”

 

He’s trudged up the stairs — with an unwelcome weight on his shoulders that had gotten progressively heavier over the years, glasses off and a hand on the back of his stiff neck — to find Eggsy leaning against the doorway of his bedroom and grinning. He’s near twenty-one now, and still grins with an easy kindness that Harry sometimes forgets exists in the world.

 

“Eggsy,” he greets, pausing at the top of the staircase. “I had planned on meeting a —” ( _pick a quick lie_ ) “— friend, an old friend, for lunch. Why?”

 

“I was thinking maybe we could grab a movie or something,” Eggsy expands, and that initially happy grin shifts into what Harry can only describe as an awkward, slightly guarded hope.

 

Hope which he practically spits in the face of when a poorly suppressed huff of laughter escapes him. It’s loaded with self deprecating humor — oh he _wishes_ he had time for something as mundane and pleasantly unsurprising as a trip to the cinema — but it must not come off that way because he can see something in Eggsy’s face snap, harden, and watches his smile drop. Exhausted, and suddenly feeling a lot more like shit than he had thirty seconds ago (which had been quite shitty), Harry deflates. That laugh quickly becomes a put-upon sigh, and they both break eye contact to glance down at the worn hall carpet; to regroup.

 

“Sorry, Eggsy,” Harry says without much energy, his apology lacks the urgent insistence of sincerity. 

 

“’s alright, Harry,” Eggsy accepts, and fiddles with the mobile phone in his hand. Briefly, Harry wonders if he’s tried calling Roxanne and found that she’s no longer picking up. “Maybe another time.”

 

“Of course,” Harry agrees, dipping his head politely as the thin veneer of manners slides back into place to mask the exhaustion that permeates his very bones. It’s cowardly, but he’s quite relieved when Eggsy slinks away into the shadows of his room and closes the door.

 

* * *

 

 

The shrill whine of electric frequency should have tipped him off, at least at the last second.

 

“Oh, man up —“

 

But it isn’t. And the blast in his face is explosive and burns a little; there’s a distinct scent that hinges between charred flesh and gun powder, but the wet slime of his face doesn’t feel a lot like blood.It’s a prickle on the back of his neck more than the sound of the door opening that alerts him to the two armed guards that have joined him and the remains of Professor Arnold in the lecture hall, and it’s well refined instinct rather than logical reasoning that has his flicking open his lighter and making a break for the window.

 

Bursting through the glass pane barely even hurts — he’s disturbingly numb, and unconscious before he lands on the concrete. 

 

* * *

 

 

“— might want to have a word with him about sharing his passwords.”

 

And with a slightly cold weight in his stomach, Merlin realizes he’s going to have to have words with a certain someone else about Harry’s condition shortly after this conversation with Arthur. The King nods and excuses himself from the infirmary, leaving Merlin to stare at Harry’s lightly battered face and thready vitals for a few long moments. Then to mutter — “Ah, fuck me,” — under his breath and pinch the bridge of his nose.

 

* * *

 

 

“What do you mean an accident?”

 

“I’m afraid that’s all I know at the moment, Eggsy.”

 

“What — what the fuck does that even _mean_ , Merlin? What kind of accident? Like he’s laid up with a busted leg or he’s _dead_?” They seem more like rhetorical, angry questions than ones the boy wants answered. As Eggsy’s breathing gets more erratic and his voice gets louder, all Merlin can do is wince. So much for not asking questions anymore; seems the boy hadn’t grown quite complacent being kept in the dark. “Where? Where is he? Can I see him?”

 

“He’s being seen to at a private medical facility at the moment, and can’t have any visitors.”

 

It wasn’t an awful idea, moving Harry to a public facility. But currently the medical staff at UK HQ were still fussing over him, and Research and Development were still trying to figure out how Professor Arnold’s gore and brain matter had been turned into colorful, metallic gunk. He had a feeling Arthur wasn’t going to let Galahad be tended to by suspicious civilians any time soon, even though he knew Eggsy existed and would be worried. This is what family did, made things all the more complicated on a personal level. Yesterday he’d nearly drowned several young men and women, and had not felt an ounce of remorse for the emotional distress he’d caused. But sitting at his desk, listening to Eggsy’s ragged breath, wet with frustration and choked with emotion, he admittedly felt a little bad.

 

Mostly just old. And tired.

 

“I’m sorry, lad.”

 

And with what can only be described as an impressive show of self control, and an unhealthy display of repressed emotions, Eggsy sniffs on the other end of the line. And he pushes all the hurt from his voice.”

 

“’s alright.”

 

“Wish I could tell you more.”

 

“But you can’t.” Merlin can imagine the leer. “It’s fine. You’ll tell me if he _dies_ , at least, yeah?”

 

And he probably would. Unless it was classified.

 

* * *

 

 

Months go by. Puppies grow into full grown dogs. Production on Richmond Valentine’s V-Chips is sped up, and he makes an announcement one morning that he’s plans to provide _free calls, free internet, for everyone, forever._

 

And Harry Hart wakes up.

 

* * *

 

 

He’s still sore when he limps up the small stairs to his front door and presses his palm to the discreet biometric pad just underneath the doorbell: stiff legs and a stiff neck from months of incapacitation, and a collection of new white scar along his face and peppering down his neck. They still itch with the ghost of shrapnel long removed. There’s a whirring of the locking mechanism and with a small click the door inches open. Inside the carpet bears an obvious lack of thorough vacuuming, but most everything else is as he left it. A few particles of dust sifted through the air, stirred up by his intrusion and illuminated by the weak sunlight from the open door at his back. The hairs on the back of Harry’s neck had been continually pricked since he woke up, but his instincts tell him the house is empty, and he breathes a little easier.

 

He hobbles into the kitchen for a glass of water, but finds himself cracking one of Eggsy’s well stocked cheap German lagers instead. His mind is alive — head aching, and running through the facts and residual questions about this mission that just carved a chunk out of his life, as if he could make up for nine months of inactivity, and logic his way through Richmond Valentine’s potential role in all the time it took him to finish his drink. But all thinking so hard does is make his headache worse.

 

Eggsy finds him leaning over one of the counters; elbows braced on the tile, index and middle fingers digging into his skull on both sides and trying to keep from hurling. He can hear him come in the front door, hesitate in the entryway, and continue cautiously into the kitchen. But harry doesn’t move until he senses the boys eyes on him. Slowly lifting his head, he notes first the smear of dirt on Eggsy’s sweatshirt. Next, the purple discoloration across half his mouth.

 

“What happened to you?” he asks. The dream of them both tastefully ignoring his most recent absence is crushed quickly and effectively with the slightest shift in Eggsy’s posture; a twitch in his face and Harry’s stomach gives another rather unpleasant lurch.

 

“How about you tell me what the fuck happened to _you_?”

 

“Eggsy —”

 

“Where the hell were you, Harry?” Now the parts of his face that weren’t purple with a fresh bruise were tinged red with unrepentant anger. “Nine and a half months, and all I got was a call from Merlin saying you were in a car accident and not waking up, and jack _shit_ else. You weren’t in any of the hospitals around, I _looked_. So where _were_ you?”

 

It wasn’t as if he hadn’t expected this conversation one day. He’d just sort of sincerely hoped it wouldn’t be _today_. 

 

“I thought you’d died.” Not the first time Eggsy’d said that to him. But it lacked to usual good humor this time around. “I think that a lot, actually. You some sort of death defying tailor?”

 

“Not exactly,” he hedges, and against all odds, Eggsy seems to tense further; like a wind up toy ready to explode with years of expertly repressed frustration.

 

“Are you going to give tell me what, then? Ever?”

 

_One day_ , Harry told himself; had entertained the notion of bringing Eggsy into the fold, into Kingsman before reminding himself that he would not, under any circumstances, endanger the boys life. After long years of having only Mr. Pickle to care for, being so emotionally invested in another person — when he was scarcely invested in his own emotional wellbeing — was a strange, trying ordeal. But squaring off in the kitchen, his head splitting open, and Eggsy radiating fury and hurt, he’s forced to acknowledge that this… this whatever they’ve forged over the years has far surpassed simply repaying Lee Unwin for his sacrifice.

 

And it’s okay if Eggsy resents him for his secrets, so long as he’s kept safe in his forced ignorance. Because that’s is what love is, isn’t it?

 

The silence that stretches between them seems to answer for him, and the carefully guarded hurt on Eggsy’s face morphs into outright hatred. “Right,” he snarls, shoulders rolling back and eyes narrowed. “Right, you can go ahead and fuck off, then.”

 

And he’s off, presumably upstairs if the stomping and rattle of a slamming door is any proper indication.

 

Harry sags after a few moments, arms braced against the edge of the counter and sighing heavily as a shuddering wave of nausea overtakes him. Sleep would prove to be an evasive pipe dream as well. And by the time he thinks up a suitable lie to pacify Eggsy with the next morning, the boy is gone.

 


	6. The One With The Phone Call

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> bet ya'll thought i gave up on this story, didn't you? don't worry, i wouldn't do that!

Jamal doesn’t look nearly as sympathetic as Eggsy would have liked. But now that it’s been a year since Roxy stopped answering his texts, he’s the only person Eggsy could think to drag out for a midday pint and a few hours of gratuitous bitching about his homelife. And even if Jama wasn’t giving him quite the generous understanding empathy he’d been looking for, it was still a lot better than hanging around home, waiting for another fallout with Harry.

 

“ — lying to me for  _ months _ ,” Eggsy bitterly mumbles into the foam of his second lager, halfway to taking a sip before thinking of more unkind thoughts to voice aloud. “And he comes home and acts like a right tosser when I ask where he’s been. He don’t share much and that’s fine, but you can’t just — just  _ disappear _ like that. And not expect any questions when you get back, right?” And his angry tirade slips into wheedling as he seeks some measure of reassurance. “Right? Tell me I’m right.”

 

Jamal sighs. “Well, you ain’t wrong,” he admits, though that doesn’t do much to ease the dull ache of discomfort curling tight in Eggsy’s chest. It’s just becomes sharper and more prominent as the residual anger had begun to fade.

 

They drink — though perhaps for different reasons. And while Eggsy drains half his glass and still figures he could down a few more pints before they leave, Jamal puts his glass on a coaster and leans his forearms on the table. “But I’m pretty sure that’s what it’s supposed to be like.”

 

“What’s supposed to be like?”

 

“Having parents. Sometimes they don’t tell you shit ‘cause they don’t want you to worry, or because they want to keep you safe.”

 

Eggsy huffs, resists cruelly asking him how he knows, having grown up in the foster system and aging out instead of being adopted. He’s been really good all their lives at not rubbing his arguably good fortune in his less fortunate friends face; they’d come from the same place in life, there was no decent reason to hold his comfortable home, good education and wanting for nothing over Jamal’s head just to make a mean point. But it’s hard to swallow his scorn when his friend is approaching this situation with such a level head and not nearly enough vitriol. So he merely scoffs and draws lines in the condensation of his glass with a fingertip. “What does he have to keep me safe from? He’s a tailor with no friends.”

 

Jamal shrugs, fiddling with the fraying sleeve of his button down. “I don’t know. Maybe he’s got a gambling problem and is in some serious debt.”

 

“Nah, I kick his arse in cards every time we play.”

 

“Maybe he kidnapped you.”

 

Eggsy doesn’t even dignify that with a response. He’s seen his adoption papers and everything.

 

“Maybe he’s a spy.”

 

He scoffs. “Fat fucking chance. That’d require him to actually be interesting.”

 

“Well, maybe he’s dyin’ then.”

 

That hits a little too close to home. The mood between them palpably drops; Eggsy stares out the dirty, cloudy window and Jamal stares at his cheap pint. But he’s persistent, and after a lengthy silence, kicks at Eggsy’s trainer under the table until he looks at him.

 

“Look, all I’m sayin’ is people lie. Sometimes for good reason. Has he ever done anything else to you? Lied about something and it comes back to hurt you?”

 

The kneejerk response is a virulent  _ yes _ , complete with slamming his hands on the table and upsetting their drinks. But… honestly? Nothing huge comes to mind after a few seconds of mulling it over. Harry had always been remarkably upfront in their discussions of anything pertaining directly to Eggsy; had always spoken to and treated him like an adult. Ever since they’d met, really. It’d been part of what made him so different from anyone else he’d ever met. So he hesitates, and that’s all Jamal needs to nod at his cell phone on the sticky table to.

 

“Maybe just call him.”

 

* * *

The church is hot and stinks of sweat, drying mud and loathsome ideals. The preacher delivering the sermon is pig-faced and balding aggressively, with a sheen of perspiration reflecting light from the tall stained-glass windows behind him so brightly it’s almost blinding. Though Harry would much rather be deaf so as to avoid the vitriol being spewed about anyone who fell outside of the norm according to South Glade Mission Church, and the thunderous approval that follows the man's every statement. He’d been raised in a respectable religious household, where they were taught to kneel, take communion and just politely frown upon supposed sinners. But the man on the pulpit preaching hate and violence in a hot summer morning is giving the whole Christian community a bad name.

 

“Charming sermon,” Merlin remarks in his ear, providing a welcome distraction from all the venom. Harry straightens in his seat ever so slightly, and tries to blend; to at least seem passive if not actively engaged. “Can you see Valentine anywhere?”

 

He can’t. Harry honestly can’t imagine he would have been let in the Confederate flag bedecked door. He turns his head ever so slightly to a security camera affixed to the wall to give his handler a better idea of what he was thinking. Merlin is quiet as he presumably hacks the church security feed —  or tries to decipher who else would be doing so.

 

“—  Jew, nigger, fag-lovers! And the Devil is burning them for all eternity!”

 

His skin is crawling and, deeming the mission useless on his own terms, Harry shifts on his pew and tries to shift past the woman in a pink cardigan to his left. “Would you excuse me.”

 

But she turns her head and stares at him with an undue amount of contempt. Like she can see through him and has a good idea of every devilish thing he’s ever done in his life — or every evil thing she  _ wants _ to see in him. She has a sharp nose, too pointed to be dainty, turned up at him with an immediate air of superiority. “Where you going?”

 

And he’s  _ well _ used up all his patience at this point. It must show on his face, for as Harry moves to stand up despite her fixed stance, the blonde sticks her nose even further into his personal space, crowding him back like a sheepdog in an unfortunate peach top.

 

“Hey, what’s your problem?” she demands, needlessly aggressive in the face of his polite disinterest. 

 

So  — and Harry is not exceptionally proud of his slip in decorum, but it feels so justified and pleasantly defiant in the moment — he looks her dead in the eyes. 

 

“I am a Catholic whore, currently enjoying congress out of wedlock with my black, Jewish boyfriend who works in a military abortion clinic.”

 

Much to his satisfaction, the woman looks as if she’s just thrown up a little in her own mouth. Harry smiles ever so slightly.

 

“So Hail Satan, and have a lovely afternoon, madam.”

 

* * *

“Go on, Eggsy. Stop being such a fuckin’ —”

 

“It’s  _ ringing _ , alright?”

 

* * *

 

The pocket just over his heart starts to vibrate with an incoming cellular call. It’s an odd sensation, weirdly heightened by the prickling anger that flushes across his neck as the peach woman screams insults at his retreating back; the rush of nervous energy as the organ music swells  — he couldn’t recall anyone playing it earlier —  and other members of the congregation slowly become aware of his presence and imminent departure. 

 

The world seemingly slows as a piercing ringing bounces through his skull, completely obliterating any and every thought  — of the mission, of leaving the church, of pursuing Valentine. Of going home.

 

He thinks he means to reach inside his jacket and answer the call, has an odd feeling he knows who it is, or at least that it’s important. He thinks he means to reach into his pocket to at least catch the caller ID, so as to make a mental note to call them back as soon as he could.

 

* * *

 

“Hey Harry,” Eggsy begins, stuck somewhere between begrudging and terribly awkward. Across the table Jamal gives him an encouraging thumbs up, and Eggsy swallows past the initial lump in his throat.

 

“Knew I’d probably miss you. Sure you’re busy, yeah? But, um. I just kind of wanted to say… Fuck, I don’t know.”

 

He’s no good at this. He falters, much more a master of channeling his feelings into neatly compartmentalized bottles and hide them deep in his gut, only to occasionally erupt in a rash string of actions. He’s out of his element and on extremely unstable footing for something that ought to be so simple and easy, right? Harry was practically like his father, and it shouldn’t be a huge deal to tell your father that you fucked up.

 

Eggsy blinks rather helplessly across the table, mouth open and shaking his head at a complete loss. Jamal mouths  _ ‘sorry’ _ at him several times over, and nods.

 

So in a rush, Eggsy vomits into the receiver: 

 

“Sorry I got all upset with you before. I just wanted to talk, so ring be back.”

 

* * *

 

He thinks he means to reach for his phone.

  
But instead he pulls out his gun. 

**Author's Note:**

> kudos & comments feed the soul and encourage me to write more.  
> in the meantime, party it up with me on [tumblr](http://floaturself.tumblr.com/)


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